Remember Me Not
by Shino Kouen
Summary: This story delves into Fujin's past. Mostly her parents and how she became an orphan. I'm really hoping I'm origional with this one. Please someone read and review this story, I'm desprately in need of feedback!


Remember Me Not  
~Hopefully Original story by Kouen~  
  
A crackling scream accompanied by tears and the waving of tiny fists split the early morning air.  
  
Edea Kramer decided that she had never heard anything more musical. The doctor brought the tiny baby to Edea and placed it in her arms. Edea, in turn, cradled the child against her chest. She was exhausted, having been in labor for hours upon hours, but she wanted this moment to last forever. She sighed and closed her eyes.   
  
Her husband, standing beside her, gently stroked the baby's cheek. "She's so pale," he told his wife, not disappointed, but in awe.  
  
Edea opened her eyes again and smiled at her baby's wrinkled, pouting face. "She's perfect," she declared.  
  
The little baby stopped crying and opened its red eyes long enough to stare up at her mother in wonder. The doctor was now on the other side of the bed.  
  
"You're baby's a very healthy girl," she told them proudly, "but you must both be carriers of the recessive allele for albinism. As you can see," she stroked the back of her finger against the baby's few wisps of silver hair, "She's inherited both genes, which makes her an albino."  
  
"But she'll be okay?" Cid, the father, asked the doctor, who smiled warmly in response.  
  
"She'll be fine, just take extra care that she doesn't stay out in direct sunlight for very long."  
  
Edea cuddled the baby close as she could, knowing deeply that she would love her daughter whether she was albino, normally pigmented, or green skinned. She chuckled softly at the thought. "Now all that's left," she purred, "Is to give you a name."  
  
~*~  
  
Wind whipped through the emerald grass, toying playfully with the pale two-year-old's silver ponytail. She held tightly to her mommy's hand as she walked on the path to the beach with her parents. They knew she felt itchy, and it made her very irritated, but her father had insisted that she wear long sleeves. Had they left her unprotected, the sun would have burnt her white skin in less than half an hour. They were always cautious because they loved her so much.  
  
They'd decided to call their little girl 'Fujin,' because the name fit her so well. The silver hair reminded Edea of the wind, and she'd been light as a feather when she was born. Even as she grew, the name seemed to grow to her even more. She was fast, as Cid often found out chasing her through the hallways when she ran off with his very-needed Sunday tie. She was quiet, too, except when she wanted something, like her breakfast, in which case she would yell, "EAT, EAT, EAT, EAT, EAT, EAT!!!!!" Until someone quickly conjured up a jar of soft food in order to save his or her own eardrums.   
  
Fujin was humming to herself as they walked, tugging her mother's hand as she bounced ahead of the couple. They got to the beach soon enough, and let her build castles in the sand while they sat on a bench nearby.   
  
Edea's heart felt heavy as she watched her daughter play. Cid sensed his wife's sadness and took her hand to press it into his own. "We can't take her, Edea," he told her sadly, "I know you want to, and I want to as well, but we both know it's not safe for her when we go to Centra. There will be too many chances that something will happen to her, or all of us, and I know you don't want that. She'll be better off staying with another family until we get back."  
  
"It might be years before we're able to return home," she reminded her husband.  
  
He sighed deeply, "I know, but we can't risk her life while we lend what help we can in Centra. The Lunar Cry whipped out almost everything, they've called upon us to lend what help we can, and we can't turn away from that call." Edea bowed her head, not bothering to stop the tears she knew would come anyway. Leaving their daughter in the hands of others would undoubtedly be the hardest thing they would ever do in their lives, but there was no other way.  
  
They'd soon regret it with all of their hearts.  
  
~*~  
  
"This is our son, Raijin," Adelia presented her son to the Kramer family. "He's three years old. He'll be Fujin's playmate while you're away. In the mean time, you can bet that we'll treat Fujin like our own daughter until you return."  
  
Edea managed a weak smile, "Thank you Miss Owens, we're very grateful."  
  
Fujin had hopped off of the couch and was tugging at Raijin's sleeve. The darker colored boy turned to grin happily at her. They ran off through the halls giggling like best friends. Edea admired how well the two got along all ready.  
  
For about an hour or so, the Kramer's sat with Adelia and Frank Owens and talked about the future of their children. Cid was sure to remind the Owens that his daughter could not stay in the sun long at all. They assured him they would take the best care of the little girl.  
  
Finally, it was time for Cid and Edea to go. They called Fujin back into the room and she stared up at them with big, sad, red eyes. She'd never been anywhere without her parents before, and didn't understand that they would be coming back. Edea bent down and hugged her daughter tightly. "I'll miss you," she whispered into her ear, "I love you, I promise I'll come back."  
  
Fujin, of course, didn't understand anything other than the fact that her parents were leaving her. They were leaving her alone, with strange people. She watched they're backs until the heavy wooden door no longer permitted it. She ran to the window and watched as they walked away down the street, hand and hand. When they were almost gone, they stopped. For a second Fujin's heart lifted, and she thought they might come back, but they didn't. Instead, her mommy turned to her daddy and buried her face in his shoulder while he embraced her. They looked sad. After a while, they continued down the street until they were out of site.  
  
Fujin cried. She cried and cried until she could cry no more. Her parents had left her! They must not want her anymore! What had she done wrong?  
  
Raijin plopped down beside her after a while, when she'd stopped crying. "Want play?" he asked her, hopefully.  
  
"NO PLAY!" Fujin shouted. She just wanted to be left alone. Still, Raijin was determined to make her feel better. He even went and got her a cookie. After an hour or so, Fujin decided to play with him, just to humor him. Raijin took her upstairs and they played hide and seek until dinnertime, when Adelia called them downstairs to eat.   
  
After a week, Fujin was still upset about her parent's disappearance. She stopped playing with Raijin and spent most of her time sitting at the window, watching the wind blow over everything. Sometimes she'd wait for her parents to come get her, but they never did.  
  
~*~  
  
Two years later, Fujin had given up on her parents. She only remembered a little bit about them. She couldn't remember their voices, or what they used to say to her. She did remember mommy's long hair, and daddy's funny glasses. She remembered taking walks to the beach in long sleeved shirts. She remembered that they didn't want her anymore.  
  
Fujin never adjusted to that feeling. She believed she must be a bad person, and it made her very unhappy. She was a very intelligent girl, and taught herself to read. Raijin, who was in kindergarten now, couldn't even keep up with her skills. She liked to play "pretend" with him, now, and she was always the hero. If Raijin put up a fight about it, she'd kick him smartly in the shin, and he'd shut up. Adelia and Frank had become very proud of little Fujin, especially when she learned to write her name, and wrote "Fujin Owens," on a piece of paper very neatly. Raijin learned to wrote his name, too, but was much more sloppy. Fujin had only one problem that got in the way of her intelligence, and it was her very bad habit of speaking one-word only sentences. She'd picked up the habit shortly after her parents left her, and never grew out of it.  
  
When Raijin was in school, Fujin would sit with the window open, and listen to the sound of the wind and the ocean. She'd watch the people walk down the street, and she waited for Raijin to come home. He'd come home bubbling full of stories about school, and how much fun it was. "I wish you couwd come to skwool, too, ya know?" He'd say to his 'little sister,' "It's so much fun, ya know?"  
  
~*~  
  
Three years after they'd left their daughter, Cid and Edea were finally able to return home. Near Centra, they'd started an orphanage, and had been needed to run it for a time before they were able to return home. The ocean winds around the orphanage reminded Edea greatly of her daughter and made her heart ache. They hadn't even been able to contact the Owens when they'd been away! Before even returning to their house, they went to the city to get their little Fujin.  
  
They marched right up to the door and knocked. An old woman answered. She smiled at them and invited them in.  
  
"I'm Abigail Fitch, it's nice to meet you."  
  
"Hello Mrs. Fitch, I'm Cid Kramer," he took her hand and shook it firmly. "Forgive us for intruding, but isn't this the Owens' residence?"  
  
Mrs. Fitch bowed her head deeply and sighed. "The Owens were a good family," she told them, "But no, they no longer live here."  
  
"Can you tell us where to find them, then?" Edea asked, panic starting to race through her heart.   
  
Mrs. Fitch raised her eyes and frowned at them. "Adelia and Frank Owens died in a house fire a more than year ago."  
  
Edea nearly fainted. "And what of the children?!"  
  
"The children were just barely rescued by a fire fighter. After that they were taken in by neighbors, and eventually sent away to an orphanage, I think. I'm not sure what happened to them, really."  
  
Edea was too shocked to talk. Cid thanked Mrs. Fitch and lead his wife away.   
  
The couple searched every orphanage they could find, but just could not track down their daughter or her playmate. Eventually, time became pressing, and they were forced to return to the orphanage without them. It broke Edea's heart, and she vowed that nothing like that would ever happen to the children of the orphanage.  
  
A year later, the Kramers started a military school near the city of Balamb. Like other military schools, including Trabia and Galbadia Gardens, Balamb Garden taught their students elemental magic and combat training, with a goal of becoming a SeeD; a special military force raised to fight a prophesized sorceress. Unlike the other Gardens, however, Balamb Garden authorized the use of Guardian Forces, powerful beings who aided the students well at winning battles, but had a very harsh side effect: a type of amnesia that erased certain memories. "Most of these kids have bad pasts, anyway," Cid had told his wife.  
  
Not long after the Garden began, two orphans where brought to be registered by an unnamed woman who'd lived in nearby Balamb. She registered the orphans without a last name, and left them at the Garden without giving any clues of the orphans' origins.  
  
The older one was a seven-year-old dark skinned boy who was to go by the name Raijin. The younger, a six-year-old albino girl, went by the name Fujin.  
  
Cid and Edea where overjoyed to know that their daughter was alive. Edea longed to scoop the girl up in her arms and hug her, but Cid would not permit it. He reasoned that if they told her who they were, they'd be faced with explaining why so much of their lives had been spent apart. Fujin herself didn't seem to remember them anyway. Raijin had introduced her as his 'little sister' to everyone. Edea wondered if the Owens had told her little girl that they were her parents. A few years in the future, Fujin wouldn't remember anything at all about her childhood. Eventually, Edea came to terms with the idea, and though heart broken, was forced to let her daughter go on not knowing of her real parents. Cid and Edea watched her grow up from a distance. They watched all of the trouble she and Raijin caused, and laughed. They watched her as she mastered the element of wind, and smiled. They watched her when she got into a nasty scrape in the training center that cost her left eye, and cried. They watched all of these things and held them deeply in their hearts.  
  
Sometimes at night Edea would roam the halls of the dorms, listening to make sure the students were asleep. When she'd pass Fujin's door, she'd whisper under her breath, "Fujin, I miss you, I love you. I promise I'll always be here if you need me."  
  
  
{FINISH!}  
  
Authoress's note: I hope you like this! I was trying to be original when I came up with the idea for the story, and hopefully I did just that. Please let me know what you think of my story! Constructive criticism is welcome!  
  
  
  
  



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